Bernie Raleigh is a failure at nearly everything he touches. Nobody notices a loser, and after being kidnapped for ransom as a child, Bernie has spent his adult life trying to avoid being noticed. That's impossible now that he's inherited his grandfather's enormous fortune. The inheritance comes complete with a mansion, a lot of obligations, and a very problematic housekeeper named Meda Amos. Beauty queen, alien abductee, crypto-Jew, single mother - Meda is all those things, and she may be the only person who can help Bernie survive his new and very public life.
Last Will is consummate storytelling. In the tradition of Charles Dickens, Alexander Dumas, George Eliot, or Jane Austen, it is a deeply engaging tale of romance, money, tragedy, and society with a healthy dose of humor and a respect for love. So curl up with the A/C on and tell your reading groups. (Reviewed by Judy Krueger).
Robert Ferrigno, New York Times bestselling author of Monkey Boyz, Horse Latitudes, the Prayer for the Assassin trilogy and other novels
Bryn Greenwood is so good it hurts. Her writing is lean, precise, elegant and dripping with the telling detail - the understated bit of dialogue that reveals everything.
Heather Sharfeddin, author of Blackbelly, Mineral Spirits, Windless Summer and Damaged Goods Last Will is a richly detailed story about finding love in a world that can scarcely offer the real thing. Bryn Greenwood's characters reveal their layer-by-layer complexity with each turning page. Their stories are heartbreaking, but never let go of dignity or beg for pity. Told without sentimentality, Last Will is an exceptional story overflowing with compassion.
Dr. Allen Wyler, author of Dead End Deal, Deadly Errors and Dead Head
A captivating, inspiring journey of two souls in need of healing.
Lisa Brackmann, author of Rock Paper Tiger and Getaway
Bryn Greenwood writes about the wounds that define us, and the possibilities and limits of recovery, with precision, humor and an unsentimental clarity of vision. I can't wait for the next book from this fresh, original voice!
Bryn Greenwood grew up in the minute Kansas town of Hugoton; ten blocks by ten blocks. After escaping to college, earning three degrees (a BA in English, a BA in French Literature, and an MA in Writing) and making up stories all the while, she completed her first novel and sent it out to agents. Ten rejections, eight other novels, and eleven years later, Last Will was finally published.
Bryn worked as a teacher in Japan and, upon returning to the United States, became a sex educator at high schools and prisons in Florida. While there, she also taught at community colleges, spent time at non-profit organizations, and met a co-worker who became a first reader of Last Will (and who is acknowledged in the novel's dedication).
Finally she returned to Kansas. "When I was younger, I wandered around the world, but came back to Kansas to write. It was the wind after all. It carried dust into the house all during my childhood and turned my hair into a rat's nest. When I got too far away from it, though, I felt unsteadied. As though I'd been out walking...
A sparkling debut novel set in the sixties about a boy's emotional and fantastical journey through alien worlds and family pain.
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Stranger than fiction, blending tragedy and farce, How to Create the Perfect Wife is an engrossing tale of the radicalism, and deep contradictions, at the heart of the Enlightenment.
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(814 words).
Robert Ferrigno, New York Times bestselling author of Monkey Boyz, Horse Latitudes, the Prayer for the Assassin trilogy and other novels
